It happen'd once upon a time,

When all his works were in their prime,
A noble place appear'd in view;

Then

-to the methodists, adieu.

A methodist no more he'll be,

The protestants serve best for he.
Then to the curate straight he ran,

And thus address'd the rev'rend man:
I was a methodist, tis true;
With penitence I turn to you.
O that it were your bounteous will
That I the vacant place might fill!
With justice I'd myself acquit,
Do every thing that's right and fit.
The curate straightway gave consent-
To take the place he quickly went.
Accordingly he took the place,

And keeps it with dissembled grace.1
April 14th, 1764.

1 It has been urged, and for an obvious reason, that the Poems acknowledged by Chatterton to be of his own composition, are of a cast much inferior to those which he produced as written by Rowley. If this be true, we should remember that Chatterton lavished all his powers on the counterfeit Rowley with whom he intended to astonish or to deceive the world, and that his Miscellanies were the temporary progeny of indigence, inconvenience, and distraction. That the former pieces were composed, with one uniform object in view, in a state of leisure and repose, through the course of nearly one year and a half; and the latter amidst the want of common necessaries, in disquietude and in dissipation, at the call of bookseller, and often on occasional topics, within four

NARVA AND MORED.

AN AFRICAN ECLOGUE.1

RECITE the loves of Narva and Mored,

The priest of Chalma's triple idol said.

High from the ground the youthful warriors

sprung,

Loud on the concave shell the lances rung:

In all the mystic mazes of the dance,

The youths of Banny's burning sands advance, Whilst the soft virgin panting looks behind, And rides upon the pinions of the wind;

months. But I do not grant this boasted inequality. If there is any, at least the same hand appears in both. The acknowledged poems contain many strokes of uncommon spirit and imagination, and such as would mark any boy of seventeen for a genius. Let me add, that both collections contain an imagery of the same sort. His first poetical production, when he was aged only eleven years and five months, is a satire on some Methodist, such a one as it was easy to find at Bristol, and is entitled "Apostate Will." It has a degree of humour and an ease of versification which are astonishing in such a child.-WARTON.

1 In a letter to his friend Cary, dated London, July 1, 1770, Chatterton tells him, "In the last London magazine, and in that which comes out to-day, are the only two pieces of mine I have the vanity to call poetry."—Dr. Gregory.

Ascends the mountain's brow, and measures

round

The steepy cliffs of Chalma's sacred ground,
Chalma, the god whose noisy thunders fly
Thro' the dark covering of the midnight sky,
Whose arm directs the close embattled host,
And sinks the labouring vessels on the coast;
Chalma, whose excellence is known from far;
From Lupa's rocky hill to Calabar.

The guardian god of Afric and the isles,
Where nature in her strongest vigour smiles
Where the blue blossom of the forky thorn,
Bends with the nectar of the op'ning morn:
Where ginger's aromatic, matted root,

Creep through the mead, and up the mountains

shoot.

Three times the virgin, swimming on the breeze, Danc'd in the shadow of the mystic trees : When, like a dark cloud spreading to the view, The first-born sons of war and blood pursue; Swift as the elk they pour along the plain; Swift as the flying clouds distilling rain. Swift as the boundings of the youthful roe, They course around, and lengthen as they go. Like the long chain of rocks, whose summits

rise,

Far in the sacred regions of the skies;

Upon whose top the black'ning tempest lours,
Whilst down its side the gushing torrent pours,

Like the long cliffy mountains which extend From Lorbar's cave, to where the nations end, Which sink in darkness, thick'ning and obscure, Impenetrable, mystic, and impure;

The flying terrors of the war advance,
And round the sacred oak, repeat the dance.
Furious they twist around the gloomy trees,
Like leaves in autumn, twirling with the breeze.
So when the splendour of the dying day
Darts the red lustre of the watery way;
Sudden beneath Toddida's whistling brink,
The circling billows in wild eddies sink,
Whirl furious round, and the loud bursting wave
Sinks down to Chalma's sacerdotal cave,
Explores the palaces on Zira's coast,

Where howls the war-song of the chieftain's ghost;
Where the artificer in realms below,

Gilds the rich lance, or beautifies the bow;
From the young palm-tree spins the useful twine,
Or makes the teeth of elephants divine.
Where the pale children of the feeble sun,
In search of gold, thro' every climate run:
From burning heat to freezing torments go,
And live in all vicissitudes of woe.
Like the loud eddies of Toddida's sea,
The warriors circle the mysterious tree:
'Till spent with exercise they spread around
Upon the op'ning blossoms of the ground.
The priestess rising, sings the sacred tale,
And the loud chorus echoes thro' the dale.

PRIESTESS.

Far from the burning sands of Calabar;
Far from the lustre of the morning star;
Far from the pleasure of the holy morn;
Far from the blessedness of Chalma's horn:
Now rest the souls of Narva and Mored,
Laid in the dust, and number'd with the dead.
Dear are their memories to us, and long,
Long shall their attributes be known in song.
Their lives were transient as the meadow flow'r.
Ripen'd in ages, wither'd in an hour.
Chalma, reward them in his gloomy cave,
And open all the prisons of the grave.
Bred to the service of the godhead's throne,
And living but to serve his God alone,
Narva was beauteous as the opening day
When on the spangling waves the sunbeams play,
When the mackaw, ascending to the sky,
Views the bright splendour with a steady eye.
Tall, as the house of Chalma's dark retreat;
Compact and firm, as Rhadal Ynca's fleet,
Completely beauteous as a summer's sun,
Was Narva, by his excellence undone.
Where the soft Togla creeps along the meads,
Thro' scented Calamus and fragrant reeds;
Where the sweet Zinsa spreads its matted bed
Liv'd the still sweeter flower, the young Mored;
Black was her face, as Togla's hidden cell;
Soft as the moss where hissing adders dwell.